SEE preparations complete; unnecessary gathering of people at exam centers restricted

BHAKTAPUR, March 18: This year's Secondary Education Examination (SEE) is beginning from tomorrow. The National Examinations Board, Office of the Controller of Examinations has said all preparations for the exam have been completed. The exam will conclude on March 30.

A total of 482,707 students are sitting for the exams which will be conducted through 1,995 centers, according to Controller of Examinations, Ramraj Khakurel. Similarly, 9,509 students are towards the technical stream. Likewise, 16,242 students will be appearing in the exams in a bid to improve their grades.

The highest number of students, 13,667 is from the Bagmati state and the lowest number 36,436 is from the Karnali state.

As Khakurel said, around 5.1 million sets of question papers have been printed for a total 86 subjects and they have been already delivered to the districts. Around 65,000 workforces will be mobilized to conduct the exams. Each center will have one superintendent, two assistant superintendents, one invigilator for every 20 students, one exam assistant for every 100 students, and one nurse for every 50 students. Each center will be guarded by a troop of 16 security personnel.

The exam will start at 8:00 am across the country. All required question papers have been already transported to a security body near the exam center.

A non-essential gathering of people at the center has been prohibited and one center will have a maximum of 300 students and one classroom will have 20-30 students.

Anyone trying to violate or violating the exams code of conduct shall deserve a legal prosecution with six months in jail or a fine of Rs 100 thousand or both.

All preparation has been over to conduct the test in a fearless environment and the government was on alert about health security of the students, said Minister for Education, Science and Technology, Giriraj Mani Pokharel.

A health desk would be set up at a location in coordination with the ministry and local level where the children taking the test can get health checkups during the examination, it has been said.

The Education Ministry has directed all 753 local levels to manage health desks at exam centers.

The body temperature of students, employees, security persons and examination inspectors would be measured to check for the virus before entering examination halls and in case, one's body temperature is measured above normal, they would be taken to a hospital immediately.

On an occasion on March 17, minister Pokharel appealed to people to stay alert against the virus. He also urged the children to attend the examination not to panic as the government has adopted preparedness in this regard. He also asked the children to adopt cleanliness measures like personal cleanliness, use of facemask, handshaking avoidance and staying away from the crowd of people.